He responds like an angry, conservative cable-news hothead, and perfectly proves their point.

On Thursday, he told viewers of The O'Reilly Factor that

"the St. Louis Post-Dispatch -- a left-wing newspaper -- blames the [public distrust of the media] on cable news."

Not quite. The PD's point was more nuanced. They pointed out that public confidence in many other institutions -- such as the Supreme Court and Congress -- is eroding. And while left-leaning MSNBC and right-leaning Fox aren't helpful, "the distrust can't all be blamed on them."

But O'Reilly makes it look like the PD's editorial board only called out O'Reilly, Sean Hannity and Greta Van Susteren as the ideologues they are.

They also call out Lawrence O'Donnell, Rachel Maddow and Ed Schultz.

O'Reilly conveniently leaves that part out, THEN has the balls to claim that public distrusts the media "because the media is often inaccurate and slanted."

What should they do instead, Bill, to get some semblance of fact-checked information or fair-minded analysis? Watch your show?

O'Reilly's conclusion:

"These Post-Dispatch people are dumb AND corrupt -- a deadly combination. And the people know
it: Circulation for the paper down 35 percent since 2003. Their parent company
has filed bankruptcy. So here's The Factor tip of the day: Don't read
the St. Louis Post-Dispatch."

It could also be that public distrust in the media is high because Americans are busy with their jobs and families, and trying to sift through B.S. like this is exhausting, and the perpetrators clearly have incentives to lie. So to protect themselves, people shut down and just say, "I don't trust any of it."